


Spider-Man: Homeless

by RosePeer



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Bat Family, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Crossover, Damian Wayne is Robin, Dimension Travel, Eventual Happy Ending, Good Big Brother Dick Grayson, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker is a Mess, Peter is adopted into the Batfam for like two days, Rip Peter, temporary family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-29
Updated: 2019-07-29
Packaged: 2020-07-25 19:09:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20030878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosePeer/pseuds/RosePeer
Summary: Peter keeps telling himself it's a dream; until, it doesn't feel like one anymore. Or the one where Peter gets adopted by the Batman while his world slowly falls apart, and he just wishes he were home.





	Spider-Man: Homeless

**Author's Note:**

> Originally going to be Spider-Man: Homeless (For 2 Seconds), but my friend told me Spider-Man: Homeless was fine. So there's that. 
> 
> And I've had this plot bunny in my head for awhile, so I'm finally writing it. Hope you enjoy.

Peter has absolutely no words. And it's a first for him. Genuinely, a first for him.

"Batman?" He asks stupidly—suddenly feeling very out of place in his Stark Suit which comparatively could have been worse like instead he could be wearing his bad diy-job-of- a-costume.

The thought sends shivers down his spine. Stark Suit, despite being very, very bright, was so much better.

Only Batman (who isn't even real) could make him feel like the idiot. It's just his face, or at least the bottom part of his face that Peter could see, that looks so disappointed (?) unamused (?) tired-of-his-bs (?) all of the above, which makes him want to crawl back to Norman's Lab and yell at other radioactive spiders to atone for their species' crimes and make him normal again.

In theory, Peter knows Batman is a comic book character, just like in theory Peter understands the stuff Shuri spouts out, about vibranium and rendering solid 3D holograms (which is to say he knew nothing because he was in fact not an expert on vibranium; he wasn’t even half an expert.)

His mind was like Shuri standing there pointing at some theoretical (‘Not Theoretical, Peter’) science on a board, but instead of science she was saying “Okay Peter, Batman shouldn't be real.”

And he was on his 3D solid hologram desk nodding like it all made sense and affirming to Shuri that “Yes, that makes perfect sense. Batman should be confined to the 2D pages of Ned's comic book collection.”

But then Batman is right there, the absolute opposite of being confined to the 2D pages of Ned’s comic book collection, standing right in front of him, real and looking exactly the same as in the comics.

And Peter means exactly the same, as in a cartoon looking Bruce Wayne is standing right in front of him—his smooth sharp chin, the solid color of his bat suit, no texture to speak of and the black outline of that creates his entire person.

He's a living breathing cartoon, and Peter just wants to poke him.

Peter doesn't for obvious reasons. Instead (smartly) he tries to escape both the Batman and this cartoon illusion he seems to be stuck in by (smartly) swinging away (just as he does all his problems.)

He aims his web randomly at a building that he mildly notes is also cartoon-looking and swings.

As interesting as this has been, he's going home, updating Mr. Stark's voicemail with everything going on. Everything but this, and then he'll pass out and pretend this didn’t happen.

He reassures himself that that's a great plan before his spidey-sense goes off, and he just barely dodges a pair of batarangs or not really because they end up hitting his webbing and sticking to it.

Because his transportation becomes a spiky many-small-cuts trap, he lets go and shoots another web, taking his momentum with him.

Ignore Cartoon Batman. Ignore Cartoon Batman. He repeats in his head like a mantra. And just maybe he'll go away.

He distinctly recalls his Psychology teacher telling him that hypnotism only works if you’re open to suggestion, so Peter is doing the not open to suggestion part of that which will hopefully get him out of this crazy dream.

It doesn't work.

His spidey-sense goes off again, and he dodges more batarangs which once again manage to attach itself on his webbing.

His spidey-sense doesn't stop going off, though, and he takes a second to look at them, head tilted in a peak examining look.

Then the innocent-looking batarangs blow up in his face, and he tumbles to the ground, where pellets appear beside him and release some type of toxic fume.

"Detecting knock out gas in the air, Peter. It's advisable to keep your mask on," Karen says somewhat helpfully into his ear even though he wasn't planning to take off his mask.

"Thanks Karen," he says anyways and dodges a fist that comes his way, only for his leg to be swiped up under him and for him to topple to the ground letting him land hard on his but.

"Ugh that does not feel good," he says from the ground.

The gas disappears and hovering over him is the wide imposing figure of Cartoon Batman who should not be that scary when he looks like an actual cartoon.

Peter flips off his butt, a couple of feet away into a loose fighting stance that takes inspiration from a Bruce Lee movie he saw twice.

Tilting his head a little bit in what Peter swears is amusement, Cartoon Batman wastes no time moving forward, cape dramatically flaring out behind him, still every bit scary even though Peter keeps reminding himself that the dude’s a cartoon and probably a hallucination.

Peter’s following punch gets caught by Cartoon Batman's hand, but the impact sends the Cartoon Bat backwards.

He didn't mean to put that much force into it, and that's the kicker isn't it, Peter is feeling insanely bad for injuring a figment of his imagination.

"Sorry," he says, unhelpfully, even after establishing the fact that his guilt is aimed towards a hallucination.

The Cartoon Batman grunts but moves forward, undeterred, and Peter only just manages to dodge under the first punch only for it to backfire when cartoon Batman's leg comes out of nowhere again and hits him in the side.

Peter doesn't know how Cartoon Batman does it when Peter is super-strengthed and not a cartoon and also supposed to be the creator-ish of this hallucination, but Cartoon Batman throughly wipes the floor with him.

None of Peters attacks touch the Cartoon Bat again, as he easily slips past them and follows through with brutal attacks that Peter can only sometimes dodge or block.

One good punch to Peter's temple later (hey, he's not the type to hold back praise where it's due) and he's out like a light.

When he wakes up, he can't feel the sheer mask on his face and he's breathing dumpster air, definitely not the first time but also not a welcome change.

Seriously, someone must have thrown out their milk and eggs and probably the vomit they’ve been saving in a plastic container under their bed for years to personally torment him.

Suddenly, he feels very humbled. Let him never take for granted Mr. Stark's suit and his built in air filter.

His nose scrunches up in disgust, and he manages to mutter out a “Gross,” before his mind catches up to the fact that his mask is gone, removed by Cartoon-Hallucination-Batman, and that’s why he’s smelling dumpster air.

Cartoon Batman is hovering over him, all cool, calculated intimidation, and Peter has never once been so terrified and simultaneously awed by a man before (or figment of his imagination, he amends.)

"Where are you from?" Batman asks gravely voiced, in a scary way that his interrogation mode could never be.

Peter thinks it must have something to do with the posture. Has to be the posture and the color. Probably the color.

Then he blinks. Where he's from...

That’s a weird question. Is that a usual question when you've just been unmasked...

He shrugs it off. Whatever. He told Captain America where he's from.

Cartoon-Hallucination-Batman could do literally nothing with that information, seeing as he’s a hallucination.

And then his brain does one of those terrible things and throws in a “Unless, he’s not your own hallucination, and you’re actually down under in some supervillain base, unmasked. And they know everything about you, and this is an elaborate scheme to reveal more about yourself.”

That sends something very, very terrible down his spine, but Peter quickly shoves that thought away as something his brain says sometimes to make him panic and keep him on his toes. There’s no way that’s the case.

Instead he looks up at Cartoon Batman, who’s still waiting for an answer.

"Queens," he says a little hesitantly. "New York."

Batman stares at him for a while, and Peter is not ashamed to say that he squirms under the white eyes of his cowl.

Then Batman does a thing, like a really weird thing. He sighs, hand going to bridge of his nose before realizing that a cowls there so just falling back to his side.

"How old are you?" 

Peter blinks again... he doesn’t know much about interrogation but that is definitely not normal.

He fights with himself a little bit and then eventually decides on-

"21?" His voice cracks as he draws out the syllable at the end, so it sounds like an open ended question.

And then he slumps forward, wishing his hands weren't secured behind his back, so he could run his palms over his face.

His voice just had to crack and then he had to phrase it as a question. Great one Parker.

Batman's head is tilted again in that same probably amused fashion, and Peter groans, feeling heat rise to his face and wishing he could bury himself alive and die of suffocation.

Morbid, but then again… Gen Z.

He then says a little pathetically after the silence continues to drag, and he continues to be intimidated, "15. I'm 15."

Peter is then thrown (gently) into the Batmobile which appears at the end of the alleyway on command, and there he spends the next couple of minutes opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water.

Cartoon Batman starts driving while Peter is still gaping, and eventually, Peter comes back to himself.

“Oh, God this is a crazy dream,” he says, giving into the dream theory to openly lean into the light up buttons in the car.

Batman gives him a side eye and grunts. “If only it was.”

Peter smiles a little bit and leans so close to one of the blinking buttons that his nose lightly touches it. With his arms still fastened behind his back and a seat belt over his chest (Batman put it on, dude was strangely or not strangely a rule slicker) this is the only way.

“Can I push it,” he asks.

To Peter’s line of reasoning if this was a dream, he might as we go ham with the Batmobile. 

Cartoon Batman doesn’t answer and does something that retracts Peter’s seat belt and snaps him backward until his back is safely against the cushiony black leather of the Batmobile.

“Hey!”

Peter tries stretching a little, but the seatbelt does not give in. The better part of his mind, tells him not to use his strength to break the seatbelt even though he’s still like 78% sure this is a dream. Damn, Aunt May for instilling manners in him.

Instead he grumbles under his breath, “This is so not cool even my own dream is working against me.” 

Cartoon Batman hears him, and they come to an abrupt stop.

Turning towards Peter, a frown on his face (but that’s not anything new except for that one time his lip twitched when Peter was on the ground dying of embarrassment), he says, all dark and cape-crusader “This is not a dream.”

“Sure,” Peter trails half-heartedly, looking out the heavily tinted window to see a bright red stop sign. “Did you just stop at a stop sign? Does Batman do that?”

Cartoon Batman starts driving again. “School Zone,” he says in his signature gravely tone, and Peter can’t help himself. He laughs.

“It’s like 6 pm,” he says, slightly breathless from laughing so hard.

Cartoon Batman doesn’t respond, and Peter is needlessly aware of how quiet it is. Maybe he’s actually offended or mad, and now Peter feels bad again.

“I mean,” his arms twitch a little at their binding, him wanting to move them around to enhance his point, “not that there’s anything wrong with that. Like I would stop at School Zone’s too. Not that I can drive. Or I mean I have a permit, and I do drive that. Not the permit. I mean cars, but wi-“

“Enough.”

Peter’s mouth snaps shut. He was definitely rambling just then, and he chances a glance at Cartoon Batman whose face is still as scowl-y as ever, giving nothing away because that’s his default expression. Dejected and a bit tired, Peter slumps a little, head lightly hitting the cool glass.

“Sorry,” he offers.

Batman grunts.

“Mr. Stark tells me I talk to much. Not in like a mean way or anything. He’s great. He gave me this suit and kind of trains me, or something, sometimes. I don’t know if I would really call it training it’s like,” Peter trails into a pause, and he feels his face heating up again.

“Ugh, sorry. I get nervous, and it’s been a long day. Just tell me to stop.”

There’s an awkward silence after that, and Peter seriously, wants to die like really wants to fly out of the car right now straight through the windshield and into a lake of lava.

He really is too tired. His mouth runs more when he’s tired which is weird because dream, but before he can think any more about that Batman answers.

“It’s fine,” he says through gritted teeth like Peter forced it out of him through torture. And that’s kind of offensive, but Peter appreciates the attempt. “What’s your name?”

“Peter,” he yawns, mouth cracking when he opens it too wide, “Peter Parker.”

Then moments later he falls asleep, head against the tinted glass of the batmobile. Even though his hands being secured behind his back was a little uncomfortable, the chairs really were cushiony, too cushiony.


End file.
